Russia in 1839 -Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia

foresight of the Holy See: the martyrs, smitten with interdiction, saw the Catholic faith sacrificed by Rome to the Greek policy; and Poland, discouraged in her godlike resistance, submitted to her fate without understanding it.*

How is it that the representative of God upon earth has not discovered that, since the treaty of Westphalia, all the Avars of Europe are religious wars ? What carnal prudence is it that can have so disturbed his vision as to have led him to apply to the direction of heavenly things, means proper enough for earthly monarchs, but unworthy of the king of kings ? Their throne has only a transient duration ; his shall endure fur ever — yes, for ever: for the priest who is seated upon that throne would be more great, more clearsighted in the catacombs than he is in the Vatican. Cheated by the subtilty of the sons of the age, he has not penetrated below the surface of things; and, in the aberrations into which his fear-policy has led him, he has forgotten to draw his strength from its only real source — the politics of faith.†

* These remonstrances, which, it is believed, do not overstep the bounds of respect, have been justified by the later edicts of the court of Rome.

† Ignorance on religious points is so 'great in the present day, that a Catholic, a man of talent, to whom I read this passage, interrupted me, saying, " You are no longer a Catholic, you blame the pope!" As if the pope was impeccable, as well as infallible, in matters of faith. Even this infallibility itself is submitted to certain restrictions by the Gallicans, who yet consider themselves Catholic. Has Dante ever been accused of heresy ? Yet what is the language that he addresses to such of the popes as he places in his hell ? The ablest minds of our times fall into a confusion of id¿as that would have excited the Q 2